Andrew Ferguson writes that "in the great struggle between cities and suburbs, raging now for a century or more, the verdict is finally in: Cities lost. The vast majority of people prefer the ``burbs.'' The long-predicted comeback of the traditional city isn't in the cards":

There are lots of obvious reasons for the cities' decline -- the decentralizing effects of telecommunications, the loss of manufacturing jobs, the inconveniences of public transit -- but Kotkin is more appalled by the steps urban planners take in hopes of reversing the decline.

``They think they can revive their cities if they make them `hip and cool,''' he says, referring to the street festivals, cafes, arts fairs, high-end boutiques and other yuppie delights that attract the young and single, the childless and rich.

``But that's not how cities last,'' he says. ``You can't build a long-term civic culture around transient populations.''

What any healthy city requires is a stable base of middle- class families. But the conditions necessary for attracting and keeping families are precisely what city planners ignore.

``They've forgotten the basics,'' Kotkin says. ``Are the schools good? Are the streets clean and safe? It's a lot easier to satisfy the yuppies with no kids than to fix the schools.''

And so city life, once the backbone of civilized social arrangements, devolves into just another ``niche lifestyle.''

Back in the 1960s, Marshall McLuhan once quipped that New York City would eventually become a shopping and Disneyland-style destination. That's already started to happen--and in San Jose, which is far more suburban sprawl that downtown city, there's already one outdoor shopping mall that simulates a few blocks of urban streets--but with 7/8ths less homeless people and drugs.

Much as I love Manhattan, I'd much rather get my dose of city living in small controlled doses, than live in an environment like that all the time.